A May 2013 graduate research panel organized by the Asia Institute's Program on Central Asia explored the changing dynamics of identity and place in the region. The interdisciplinary session saw presentations by a linguist, an anthropologist and a geographer, respectively.

This engaging portrait of UCLA History Professor Nile Green, who is the director of the Program on Central Asia, was published in the Winter 2013 edition of "The UCLA College Report," a publication of the College of Letters and Science.

Departing from texts in Chinese, Persian, Urdu and other languages, scholars at an international conference, "The Roads to Oxiana," look at Central Asia in the ages of camel caravans and horsemen and of motor cars and airplanes. Audio podcasts of the conference presentations are now available.

Miriam Robbins Dexter, a lecturer in the Department of Women's Studies and expert on ancient heroines and goddesses, and a co-author have completed a cross-cultural study of stories and artifacts in which women lift their skirts and expose their genitals, a performance that drives away enemies and returns joy and fertility to the land.

Over the coming three years, the UCLA Asia Institute will continue to promote study of Central Asia, with the help of outside faculty and new funding from the International Institute. Last month on campus, international scholars engaged in a day-long discussion on the region's history, arts, and cultures.

With a film screening and a panel discussion, the UCLA Asia Institute and partners launch a Central Asia Initiative. The goal is to understand societies and cultures long on the fringes of study. Anticipating a UCLA conference in October 2008, historians on the panel ask what changed on the steppes of Central Asia as states acquired the means to move and deport whole peoples, and as nomads increasingly stayed put.

Reports

Here are some reference materials from past activities of the inititative.

In his introduction to Usman Saparov's film at the March 13, 2008 screening, David MacFadyen situates "Little Angel" in the context of the Soviet-era political climate and film culture of Turkmenistan in the 1970s to 1990s.